Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s decision not to remove trees near his property. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision-making process, or a significant personal injustice caused to Mr X, to warrant an investigation.

The complaint

1. Mr X lives in a house near tall Council-owned trees. He complains the Council has:
1. failed to remove the trees;
2. not consistently applied its policy for the removal of trees in its area.
2. Mr X says the trees are dangerous and unsafe. He says other trees have fallen and damaged property and that he cannot use his garden for fear of the trees falling down and causing damage to people or property. Mr X wants the Council to remove the trees.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. We investigate complaints of injustice caused by ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We cannot question whether a council’s decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider whether there was fault in the way the decision was reached. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
4. The Ombudsman must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide:

• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or
• any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information provided by Mr X, the Council’s tree policy, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. The Council considered Mr X’s request for the removal of the trees. Its policy is to only remove trees officers consider pose a hazard, or to make safe trees which are imminently dangerous. Officers noted the trees’ location and reviewed the inspections carried out on them, including the last one in October 2021. They determined the health, condition and location of the trees meant no works were currently required.
7. For the Ombudsman to criticise a council’s professional judgement decision, there has to be evidence of fault in the process officers followed which, but for that fault, a different outcome would have been reached. In making its decision, the Council considered Mr X’s request and his reasons for wanting the trees felled, considered its inspection information and applied its policy. There is not enough evidence of fault in its decision-making process to allow us to go behind that Council decision here. I realise Mr X disagrees with it, but it is not fault for a council to properly make a decision with which someone disagrees.
8. I note Mr X says the Council has felled other healthy trees as a precautionary measure. He wants the same to be done for the trees near his property. Councils are entitled to make different decisions about works to trees in other locations. If the Council’s decision to remove the other trees did not comply with its usual policy on dealing with healthy trees, or was not properly made, the Ombudsman should not urge it to repeat those errors when dealing with other trees. Any good fortune residents living near the removed trees received from that Council decision is also not a significant personal injustice to Mr X.
9. Mr X’s claimed injustice is that different trees have fallen and damaged property. But this has not happened with the trees near his property, so is not his injustice. I recognise Mr X is concerned the trees near his house may also fall. But we cannot remedy injustices from events which have not happened, and Mr X’s concern about what he considers may happen is not itself sufficient personal injustice to justify an investigation. Any claim for personal injury or property damage which someone claims is the fault of a council would also in the first instance be a matter for that council’s insurers.

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Final decision

10. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because:
• there is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision to justify us investigating;
• the matter does not cause him a significant personal injustice which warrants an investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman